RealtyTrac: Foreclosure filings down for 12th month in a row, but will it last?

For the 12th month in a row, nationwide foreclosure activity was down compared to the month prior and the year prior, and many West Michigan counties saw similar drops.

However, signs indicate that decline may soon be over, according to California-based RealtyTrac, which tallies foreclosure filings nationwide. Take the third quarter as a whole and foreclosure activity was up slightly from the previous quarter, ending three consecutive quarterly decreases, RealtyTrac CEO James Saccacio said in a statement.

“This marginal increase in overall foreclosure activity was fueled by a 14 percent jump in new default notices,” he said, “indicating that lenders are cautiously throwing more wood into the foreclosure fireplace after spending months trying to clear the chimney of sloppily filed foreclosures.”

Kent, Muskegon and Kalamazoo counties all registered drops in September compared to August and a year ago, with the annual drops ranging from 37 percent in Muskegon County to 41 percent in Kalamazoo County. Kent County dropped 39 percent.

The amount of time it takes a home to go through the foreclosure process is getting longer, as is the number of days it takes to sell a home in foreclosure.

Nationally, it took an average of 336 days to complete a foreclosure process, that is up from 318 in the second quarter. Selling a home in foreclosure took an average of 318 days in the third quarter, up from 245 days.

The state with the longest foreclosure process? New York. In the third quarter it took an average of 986 days to complete the foreclosure process.

Michigan remains among the 10 states with the highest foreclosure rates and filing totals in the third quarter. With one foreclosure filing for every 146 households, the state has the seventh highest foreclosure rate. It came in behind Nevada, California, Arizona, Georgia, Florida and Utah. Also joining the top 10 were Idaho, Illinois and Colorado.